#PennedPossibilities #Writing 616 Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Against all logic, Loren, a 15 year old Mexican kid from the 21th century, loves old country music and sometimes dance to such beats, act which delights the Old Hag…=)
#PennedPossibilities #Writing 615 What is the best time of day for you to write?
When I have time and people don't interrupt me every five minutes. I once was able to write in the middle of the night, but my current Feline Overlord prefers me to use that time to play with him. But I can write at any time without problem…=)
#PennedPossibilities 616: Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Alford lost his right foot when he was six, when he was mauled by a bear; he earned the byname 'Bearbane' by successfully fighting it off until help arrived.
Magni's most treasured possession isn't his copy of the Handbook (his religion's holy book), but a cheap copper hair ring given to him by his boss' daughter, Hope.
#PennedPossibilities 616
Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
I don't know if It's bizarre, but I have a character who only wears shades of purple or pink. I originally did that to distinguish her in one book, so the sighting of her would stand out. Now that her story's being told in greater detail in my WIP, I made it a feature.
616. Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
I'll have to skip this one. I know hyper-specific details, but they aren't bizarre or completely irrelevant. Details about my characters surface as I write them (with a few basic traits in the planning stage) and everything is relevant to the story.
I don't know... (weeps bitterly).
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Colette's favourite opera is Phantom of the Opera and it's only dumb luck that has prevented her from telling Alycia or anyone else who would, um, correct her.
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Jimmy's cocktail of choice is an Aviation. It's dreadfully fancy, but that's part of the charm.
When Isabel was young, she fell through the ice over a river and narrowly escaped death by hypothermia; it was the quick response of her friend Archer (who was already planning to go into medicine and therefore knew what to do) that saved her.
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
I had to jump in on this. Roan loves Stardew Valley. He loves playing it, he loves marrying all the male characters and adopting all the pets. He will admit this to no one, but Dylan already knows, and thinks it's cute.
#pennedpossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Zaphod's prom date.
This is something he doesn't know, in any of the versions of him that I've used.
The exact story varies depending on which version it is, but his prom date wasn't human, it was an alien being known as a Mimaran.
In Leland's segment of the cosmos, the various alien species are not yet widely known to exist at all. There are some people that know, including Leland, but there's some concerns among the galactic residents that earth regaining a strong magical field could be a detriment. They want time to reestablish their technologies that are based around the magical field before contacting earth on a broad level.
The Mimarans are single celled organisms. But the structures of their cells allow them to mimic anything roughly the same mass as them. They can do so to such a fine degree that it takes technology earth doesn't have yet, or magic to discover, and they have tricks around those. They can copy anyone they can get a genetic sample of, it isn't just looking like a random human.
So, this Mimaran was one of their scouts, sent to do another survey of earth to see how things were progressing.
It became she, and went to school in the same place as Zaphod. Zaphod being Zaphod took interest in a *gorgeous* new student, and they dated. The Mimaran was interested in current human social structures, so went along with it. Even to the point of designing a dress to "grow" as part of her form.
They danced, they had a great time, they went to Zaphod's home and Zaphod had sex for the first time. Mimarans do not reproduce that way, though they can reproduce sexually; it's just more of two Mimarans budding off part of themselves and combining it with the bud of another.
The next morning, Elizabeth was gone. Nobody saw her again. Zaphod was a bit upset, and filed a missing persons report, but nothing was ever discovered.
"Elizabeth" returned home, with her bolus of human genetic material that Zaphod had so happily given her. Having enjoyed his company, she set about mingling those genetics with a bud of her own.
Thus, there is a Mimaran child that, while not even part human in any real sense, is still Zaphod's only offspring. It can look exactly like him, and often behaves in similar ways, delighting its/his parent.
This child, and its parent, have returned to earth multiple times to see concerts by Zaphod's band, but have never contacted him, nor are they ever likely to.
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
Keyra can mindlessly shove food into her mouth while reading a book as in she doesn't even think about it she'll just pop bite after bite of grapes, berries, chocolate into her mouth while losing herself in a book.
#StarlightSeries, #SliceOfLife
#PennedPossibilities What is the best time of day for you to write?
No time is better or worse than any other. I'm a lazy and disorganized person.
I'm kinda bragging.
#PennedPossibilities What is the best time of day for you to write?
You ask me this question and suddenly I'm like, do I write? When, when do I write? I can't remember ever writing. Well, that's because you're ALWAYS writing.
A: I have zero idea.
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
[The meeting of the two Reluctant Moon MCs is mentioned in the book, but the irrelevant detail is the prejudice he felt.—RS]
Streak had thought he'd heard his little sister cry out. He ran to find her. When he'd found the kids making fun of a girl in the neighborhood playground, some kicking mockingly at her, he almost joined in.
She was a daemon girl! Black as tar, with neither feathers nor wings. What was she doing invading a poor day angel neighborhood? To break things? Steal things? Had she come to demonstrate her daemonic superiority as his mother always claimed her type did? To rub their noses in it? Mother repeated it again and again: her kind were ugly in face and ugly in deed (though she employed one or two). She had the horns of a bull! Pointy, upturned. She cowered, and he believed she hid a cow face. He believed enough to stomp in, to help kick her out of the neighorhood.
But she cried.
(Just like a day angel would.)
And she was a girl.
(No wings, but she was slight and little and... Cute.)
You didn't do things like this to a girl!
(School taught that, and he believed everything his teachers taught about women and how men had to treat them, too.)
In the end, he yelled and screamed and flapped his wings (he was a big boy) and scared the other kids away. He scared the daemon, too, but she clung to him shivering, thanking him...
...and his life changed. She was named Thorn Rose.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
#gender #fiction #writer #author
#mystery #thriller #romance #sf #sff #sciencefiction
#writing #writingcommunity #writersOfMastodon #writers
#RSdiscussion
#RSstory #RSReluctanceStory
#microfiction #flashfiction #tootfic #smallstory
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story
Shishi keeps strange souvenirs of Ume, like Adachi in "Adachi to Shimamura."
(The problem is once I discover these details, they always end up in the plot. I believe nothing is irrelevant, just hidden or unmentioned.)
#PennedPossibilities 616 — Name a bizarre and hyper-specific detail that you know about one of your characters but is completely irrelevant to the story.
I should have made a Marvel joke, but...
Junk is a Master (or Iron) Chef level cook. He's absolutely amazing in the kitchen, and that goes for both baking and cooking. No one makes a better crème brulée. The synthetic eggs he uses are a very high quality as well. (Not a bad idea for us struggling Americans right now.)
#PennedPossibilities 615: What is the best time of day for you to write?
I am the darkness. 
I write best at ungodly hours and/or during the witching hour while cuddling.
#PennedPossibilities 615: What is the best time of day for you to write?
I do most of my writing in the evenings, but that's a necessity of working full-time.
I like writing in the afternoons, but even at weekends, I'm constrained by jobs that need the daylight/shops to be open/the neighbours to put up with hammering, etc.
#PennedPossibilities 615 — What is the best time of day for you to write? (Early or late morning, midday, afternoon, or nighttime?)
The best time would be, of course, on my walk to work in the morning. But when I actually write is at night; I need to get some of my excess energy burned out and OCD rituals over with before I can actually sit down and focus.
#PennedPossibilities 615 — What is the best time of day for you to write? (Early or late morning, midday, afternoon, or nighttime?)
It changes in phases. Over the years, it's sometimes been early mornings, sometimes between breakfast and lunch, and this year, so far, it's evenings by candlelight.
#PennedPossibilities 615 — What is the best time of day for you to write? (Early or late morning, midday, afternoon, or nighttime?)
All day long is best. On non ideal days I write whenever "free time" overlaps with "non complete exhaustion".
八尺様
